A Beautiful Partnership
by Kitty.M.Smith
Summary: A basic story on how Fran and Baltheir met and became partners. Not really edited, just a simple little one shot. Still hope you all enjoy it. :)


Hey, this is just a little drabble. I haven't finished the game so I don't know all the outcomes and I personally would like to ask no one reveal anything to me (though a strategy on how to defeat the spiders and the creatures after them in that underground railroad type place would be a BIG HELP). These are my personal opinions on all this but I do ship Fran and Baltheir but this one is based on the idea they truly are a professional relationship, if not a friendship.

So yeah. I hope y'all like this.

(note no editing was done)

Game goes to it's company, the story itself is mine

* * *

Fran slowly walked up to the counter of the bar. She leaned over on the counter, crossing her legs.

"One Spring-a-Lou, please." She said to the bartender.

"Coming right up Madam." He nodded and turned around and began preparing said drink. While he did so, Fran let her eyes travel to the other patrons of the bar. There were all walks of life there, but most of them seemed to be from Low Town. She wasn't surprised. The bar was dirty, bugs crawled on the floor freely while a mangy bone thin cat lay lazily in the corner, snoring. Mold decorated the walls in various places, dust was on nearly everything. Fran thought it pathetic. As always, she had her uneasy feeling about her since she left home.

"Here you go, Madam."

Fran looked up. The bartender was holding out the fruity drink too her. She took it, reached into the sack she had tied across her waist, and handed him a coin. He bit it, then smiled at her and tossed it in the jar behind the counter.

Fran turned her back too him, finding the wall far more attractive than any hume. She sipped the drink and sighed. It reminded her of home. She swirled the liquid around in the glass and stared at it in a trance. As a Viera, she'd shamed herself and become an outcast by leaving her tribe. She would still be allowed back, though not with open arms.

But she didn't want to go back.

She wanted adventure. Though, scraping for coins by doing odd jobs for various merchants wasn't what she had in mind. She shrugged to herself and sipped the drink, still some what in her own world. She'd make it. Somehow.

She had too Spring-a-Lous before deciding she should stop, less she be taken advantage of in a drunken state by one of the male patrons, most of which had filthy hunger shining in their eyes as they looked upon her.

As she walked out, a stranger in a cloak bumped into her. Since he-it was definitely a he- was much larger than she was, she was tossed back to the floor. She glared up at him, seeing piercing green eyes and the face of a Hume under the hood.

"I'm sorry Madam, I wasn't looking were I was going." He had an accent that flaunted wealth and higher learning.

"Sure as hell weren't." Fran said back.

The man didn't seem fazed and offered his hand to her. Fran grudgingly took it, being pulled to her feet. She dusted herself off.

The stranger opened his mouth to speak, but Fran walked past him, out of the bar and down the street. She needed a place to stay. She checked the various shops she had run errands for, but found none of them could or would provide her with a place to stay. She didn't know the city well and, though she'd never admit it, began to worry. It was beginning to get cold and, despite her heat retaining skin, she shivered.

She stopped in the middle of a bizarre. All the stands were covered, doors closed, and goods packed up securely, out of her reach. No nook or cranny was big enough for her to curl up in and try to stay warm.

"I can provide the shelter you seek."

She nearly jumped upon the low roof of a nearby shop at the sound of the voice of the same stranger as before. She twirled around and glared.

"To hell with you!" She growled.

"You're very sweet." He said back, smiling. There was a clever look on his face, like he had a plan. Fran took a step away from him.

"Leave me."

He chuckled. "My dearest apologies, Viera. I haven't any manners, have I? My name is-"

"RUN!"

"Um, no it's-"

"_Run!"_

Fran didn't give an explanation and booked it down the street. She'd felt the Mist approaching, and with it a dangerous, dangerous creature. She was unarmed exempt from a dagger good for little beyond fending off the common pick pocket and opening cans of foodstuffs. She heard footsteps proceed hers and glanced back. The stranger was running with impressive speed, soon by her side. She was shocked. Viera speed and Hume speed were too very different ranks, Viera being the advanced. She'd never thought a Hume could even get close to her speed.

"Dragon!" The man wheezed, stumbling over a loose stone and regaining his stepping.

Fran looked back and saw, indeed, a horse sized dragon with a long neck and spiked tail, leaving a black trail of poison behind it as they ran. They were soon out of the town and into the large expanse of field surrounding the city. The man collapsed to the ground a few hundred yards out. Fran fell a hundred or so yards away from him. The dragon caught up and stood over the panting man. Fran swore she could see a sneer on its face as it flicked its tail and sent the man flying. Fran thought for sure he was dead as she rose shakily to her knees. She was more than surprised when he jumped to his feet, looking like nothing had been done too him.

From his belt he drew two firearms. Fran could tell they were reasonably powerful, if you were fighting a Hume or Bangaa. Against a dragon, they were near useless. When he shot, it bounced off the hard skin. Fran gripped the grass and watched as the dragon shot fire at him and rose a few feet in the air, swishing its tail at him. He dodged swiftly, shot, dodged, shot, repeated the process and repeated the process. It was a few minutes and he was burnt in several places and the dragon was near un harmed.

It was so pathetic Fran nearly choked.

Even she with a dagger could do better. It was then, having caught her breath, she stood and drew her dagger. She cautiously stepped toward the dragon from behind. The man looked over curiously. Fran motioned for him to keep distracting the beast and he did so. She then jumped high in the air and landed on the back of the dragon, avoiding the small spikes down its spine. It didn't seem to notice. She scurried up to its head, where it did notice. It started flailing around, spinning and jumping and flapping its wings. Fran decided what she was going to do and acted upon it, stabbing out the creatures two eyes. It let out a cry of pain and fell to the ground, stumbling and bleeding profously. She then moved back and cut off both its wings at the joint.

The man, though seeming shocked, loaded his guns and fired rapidly into the mouth of the animal. After a few rounds and some more eye stabs from Fran, it fell in a heap. She leaped off it's side and walked in front of it, touching her hand to the face and pulling it back, covered in blood.

The man crinkled his nose. "Well that's entirely unsanitary."

"Pansy." She smirked and wiped the blood on the dragon.

"I never did get to introduce myself. My name is Balthier." He held out his hand. Fran looked at it and then twerked her ears in a diamond shape and gave a slight bow, a Viera greeting of respect. Balthier nodded slightly.

"You are fresh from the forest, aren't you?"

Fran nodded.

"How long have you been in the real world m'dear Viera?" He raised an eyebrow.

"A month." She said simply.

"Oh _my._ So young." He chuckled. "Oh well. You'll learn much under my wing."

She pursed her lips. "I never said I was going to...go under your-you don't even have wings!"

He chuckled again. "Oh you're adorable. It's a figure of speech Viera."

"My name is Fran." She hissed slightly.

"Well, Fran, "under my wing" is the way one may say they wish to take and teach you things you need too know. Therefore, I am the teacher, and you are the student."

"I do not wish to learn from a Hume."

"You're stubborn." He said.

"You're a Hume." She said.

"Are you saying you do not wish to learn from me simply because of my species? Isn't that rather racist? And I really don't think it is a valid reason at all."

Fran narrowed her brow. She then looked at the ground. She wasn't going to admit it, but he was right...

Balthier walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder, startling the young woman and making him chuckle once more.

"Now, how about I take you to my home and we discuss our, eh, partnership? Hm?" He gave her a half smile.

She hesitated, but nodded. "What of the dragon?"

"Oh, I've got people on that."

He began walking back to the town and Fran followed. She moved her ears around aimlessly and looked at him.

"How did you recover so quickly?"

"Recover?" He glanced to her and continued on. "Oh, when the dragon was about to kill me. Handy little things, these potions." He took a vial from his pocket containing a glowing blue liquid. "These heal a certain amount of anyone's health. You can never be quite sure, but I took a full healer and was good as new."

"Ooooh." Fran nodded, eyes widening in fascination. She took the bottle from Balthier and examined it. Sniffed it, patted it with her ears. She nibbled at the cork before the bottle was taken away.

"No, no chewing rabbit girl." Baltheir chuckled as he put the bottle away. Fran glared.

"I am not a rabbit girl hume!"

"Right, right, Viera." He put a hand on her shoulder and drew her closer, stopping suddenly in the town square. "Hold on tight."

Fran had absolutely no intention of doing so and was about to say this when a long rope dropped in front of them and Baltheir grabbed her around the waist with one arm and held onto the rope with the other. Fran was in almost scared awe as they were lifted into a huge airship and set down lightly on the inside deck. There was no one around. Fran slowly went to a window and looked out as they began flying far, far away from the town until it was gone. Baltheir came to her side.

"This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship." He said.

"We are not friends." Fran corrected. "We never will be friends. We will be partners. Equal partners." She turned her head to him and held out her hand. "Partners who are not different to one another and who stand together. That is what we will be, and that is the only option, hume."

Baltheir looked surprised but didn't hesitate to shake her hand. "Alright then. But if we are to be equal, you shall address me as Baltheir, none of this "hume" stuff."

Fran paused. "That can be arranged. Do not call me rabbit girl, or Viera, call me Fran."

A smile played at the corners of Baltheir's lips. "That can be arranged as well." He looked out the window before bringing out a bottle of champagne from a cubbord and two glasses. "Do you drink, vi-I mean Fran?"

Fran only nodded and took the glass that was offered too her, sipping it. After Baltheir poured himself a serving and put away the bottle he raised his glass.

"A toast, to a beautiful...partnership." He said.

Fran had to take a moment to remember how a toast went. She faintly recalled seeing traders clinking their glasses with a young man while a woman to the side held a new baby and guessed that was it. She raised her glass and clinked it against his. "To a beautiful partnership."

They were quite right. Over the next ten years, many reckoned there wasn't a more beautiful partnership than that of Baltheir and Fran, a deadly duo who stuck together from the time they landed to the time they took off once more.


End file.
